SAN FRANCISCO / Homeless project's army of citizens calls year success / Mayor's gathering of volunteers ensures neediest have access to shelter, services

Published 4:00 am, Wednesday, October 19, 2005

Photo: PAUL CHINN

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Michael Sasseen, who just arrived from Memphis, checks-in to the program with volunteer counselor Angelina Cahalan. Several hundred people waited in line for several hours at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium for social assistance at the bi-monthly Project Homeless Connect program on 10/18/05 in San Francisco, Calif.
PAUL CHINN/The Chronicle MANDATORY CREDIT FOR PHOTOG AND S.F. CHRONICLE/ - MAGS OUT less

homeless19_077_pc.jpg
Michael Sasseen, who just arrived from Memphis, checks-in to the program with volunteer counselor Angelina Cahalan. Several hundred people waited in line for several hours at the Bill ... more

Photo: PAUL CHINN

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Angela Alioto, who authored the city's ten-year plan to end chronic homelessness, laughs with Rocky McGriff, as he danced while waiting in line for services. Several hundred people waited in line for several hours at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium for social assistance at the bi-monthly Project Homeless Connect program on 10/18/05 in San Francisco, Calif.
PAUL CHINN/The Chronicle MANDATORY CREDIT FOR PHOTOG AND S.F. CHRONICLE/ - MAGS OUT less

homeless19_052_pc.jpg
Angela Alioto, who authored the city's ten-year plan to end chronic homelessness, laughs with Rocky McGriff, as he danced while waiting in line for services. Several hundred people waited ... more

Photo: PAUL CHINN

SAN FRANCISCO / Homeless project's army of citizens calls year success / Mayor's gathering of volunteers ensures neediest have access to shelter, services

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Barry Cowart stood in front of the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium, staring at the 200 homeless people in a line snaking into the front door. He threw back his head and laughed, the sound rippling out in a mix of relief and exuberance.

"Last April, that was me in that line," he said. "I'd been sleeping in the Greyhound bus station for months, and then I came here to this thing they do every month. That day, they got me into a residential hotel room."

The grin on his face subsided, and he looked down at his shoes. "I've been inside ever since," Cowart, 50, said quietly. "For the first time in my life, I know people can truly care. I mean, truly."

The "thing" he referred to is Project Homeless Connect, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom's monthly gathering of volunteers to help his city's street people -- and Tuesday was its first anniversary.

On Oct. 13, 2004, the mayor kicked off his concept with a walk through the Tenderloin with a handful of participants and street counselors, unsure what they had to offer homeless people, or just how to give it. By the end of the day, they had placed 24 into shelter and housing -- and got a taste of success.

That taste has now grown into a regularly occurring feast.

Since that first foray, Project Homeless Connect became a veritable citizen army that assembles between 1,000 and 2,000 community and government volunteers from all over the nation at the auditorium every other month to help more than 1,000 homeless people get into shelter, permanent housing, counseling and health care. While the homeless are being hooked up to those services, they get massages, food, clothing, blankets, and even kibble for their dogs or cats. On the off months, the volunteers assemble for a day of training.

The event has attracted so much notice that representatives of 30 cities from New York and Chicago to Los Angeles and Sacramento have come to check out the past few gatherings, and on Dec. 8 they plan to simultaneously begin identical events of their own in tandem with San Francisco's eighth Connect.

"It's daunting and overwhelming to even consider doing something this big," said Kathleen Gardipee, a representative of Portland, Ore., who came to help prepare her city for its own Connect in December. "But this is amazing. It has such great energy, and it's such a great idea, we just have to try it."

Newsom warned the volunteers -- as well as Gardipee and the 20 other out-of-towners who came to pick up tips Tuesday -- not to expect that these events will be the end-all answer for homelessness. But he said the evidence is in that they are making a difference.

"When you're on the street, you can lose hope, and what you guys are doing is providing hope," he told the crowd just before it sang him "Happy Birthday," in honor of his 38th birthday last week. "Please don't think things have to go perfectly all the time. People will appreciate another person going down on one knee to help them."

Over the past year, including Tuesday, the Connect efforts have helped 6,822 homeless people, putting 646 into shelter or housing, 1,583 into medical or mental health care, and the rest into legal counseling, food programs or other services. A total 11,382 individual volunteers pitched in.

"We've never seen anything like this back home, but I'm sure we will soon," said Steve Radin of Pittsfield, Mass., who came to San Francisco to visit his daughter-in-law -- psychologist Phaedra Caruso-Radin, also a volunteer -- and wound up helping out Tuesday. "It needed someone to start it off, like this mayor, and make it work so people could see that it could. Now it can spread."

Chris Gardner, who was homeless in the Tenderloin in the 1980s and rose to become a millionaire stockbroker, marveled how a new method could be created from the simple, ageless wisdom of people reaching out to each other. He's in town this month while actor Will Smith films "Pursuit of Happyness," based on Gardner's life.

"Where the hell were you 23 years ago?" he asked Newsom, chuckling.

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